"See," said he, "I believe thee always: say, dost thou never do anything against me?" "Never, never, my dear fellow!" answered Victor. "Now, then, forgive my heat," the other continued. "Thus have I already, with my cursed jealousy, once tormented Clotilda herself in Maienthal. But wrong not Matthieu; it is he, rather, who tranquillized me. He told me, to be sure, what Clotilda's parents thought they observed; nay, still more,--see, I tell thee everything,--he said they had even, on account of thy presumed liking and thy present influence, which the Chamberlain would fain avail himself of for his reinstatement, spoken of a possible betrothal to their daughter, and had even spoken to her and sounded her on the subject; but (to thee, however, this is a matter of indifference) my beloved remained true to me, and said, No." Now was the hitherto so happy heart of our friend broken: that hard No had never yet been uttered to him. With an inexpressible, crushing, but meek woe, he said, softly, to Flamin,-- "Be thou, too, always true to me, for I have very little; and never torment me more as thou hast to-day." He could say no more; the stifled tears stormed surging up over his heart, and painfully collected themselves under the pupil; he must needs now have a still, dark place, where he could weep to his heart's content; and in his lacerated and smarting bosom there remained only one soft and balmy thought: "Now, in the night, I can weep as much as I will, and no one can see my shattered face, my shattered soul, my shattered fortune." And when he thought, "Ah, Emanuel, if thou shouldst see me as I am to-day!" he could hardly any longer contain himself. He fled, with suppressed tears, unconcerned who saw it or did not see it, out of the garden, over which a dark angel let float a great funereal banner and the music of a dirge. He bruised himself against a stone garden-roller which was used to crush the _sprinkled_ grass-blades and _flowerets_,--he wept not yet, but on the observatory there would he satisfy himself and steep himself in abundant sorrow,--he kept repeating, "But she remained true, and said, No, no, no!"--the concert-tones glided after, like fire after the conjurer,--he waded through moist, slumbering lawns, which concealed their flowers, and, swifter than he, swept over the earth the shadowy outlines of the clouds overhead chased by the wind,--he stood at the foot of the observatory, still held back every tear, and hurried up,--he threw himself on the bench where he had seen Clotilda for the first time afar off, in a white dress,--"Rest thou, too, Horion!" she had called to him out of his dream from under the flowery hill, and he heard it again.----